


Who Could Ever Learn

by sanctuary_for_all



Series: A Thousand Ways [10]
Category: Beauty and the Beast (2017), Beauty and the Beast - All Media Types, Hawaii Five-0 (2010)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Beauty and the Beast Fusion, Feels, First Kiss, Fluff and Angst, Humor, M/M, Slow Burn, This Is Probably A Sign of Derangement On My Part
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-04-25
Updated: 2018-08-03
Packaged: 2018-10-24 02:04:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 8,236
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10731897
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/sanctuary_for_all/pseuds/sanctuary_for_all
Summary: "You know, a narrator would be really helpful right now."When Danny’s forced to move to another village in order to be close to his daughter, he runs into a forgetting spell no one else seems to notice and a cursed guy with fur and zero interpersonal skills. The first is annoying as hell, but it's the second that may just end up changing his life. (a McDanno "Beauty and the Beast" AU)(Yes, I know how that sounds. Just trust me.)





	1. Chapter 1

“You know, a narrator would be really helpful right now.” Danny kicked back the rickety wooden chair in the tiny guard station, gesturing broadly at the only person in this town outside of his blood relatives who he would even _think_ about considering a friend. “Some disembodied voice that came out of the sky and explained to me why everyone in this town is so _weird_.”

Meka, the Lead Constable of this picturesque hellhole, took another sip of beer. “Has it ever occurred to you that maybe _you’re_ the weird one?” he asked, clearly amused. He’d hired Danny almost immediately, even though there was little proof that the town had enough crime to justify even one lawman. Danny would owe him forever for that alone, but he also was compassionate enough to hang out with him sometimes rather than go home to his adorable, still-together family.

Danny shook his head. “Not once. And do you want to know why?” He leaned forward. “Because none of you are even the _slightest_ bit curious about why there is not one _single_ noble around here to take taxes and handle things like road repairs. _All_ of the other districts around here have their own nobles to do things like that, except for this one, and yet not one _single_ person I mention it to seems to process just how strange that is.”

Meka’s brow furrowed, as if trying to process that, then his expression cleared a moment later. He shrugged. “We take up a collection for the roads. It’s kind of like taxes.”

Danny threw his hands up in the air. “But there should be some rich, titled asshole out there whose job it is to do that. And if something happened to him, the king should have sent a new asshole to take over for the first one. But there isn’t, and he hasn’t, and no matter how many times I bring it up everyone seems to immediately forget I said anything the moment the words leave my mouth.”

Meka’s brow lowered, as if he was just now realizing how weird that was. Once again, it disappeared almost immediately, the same way it always did when it looked like Danny might actually be getting through to him. “You worry too much, brother.” He set his bottle down on the desk, clapping Danny on the shoulder. “You need to relax.”

Danny sighed. He’d heard that same comment from Meka twice now, as well as less affectionate variations from several other presumably intelligent people, as if that was the official landing place for any local who dared think too hard about how weird their complete lack of governmental system was. He was tempted to blame magic, because magic users in his experience were jerks, but honestly he couldn’t see a reason for a spell that big. Why make everyone forget about one guy and his family?

Not a question he had the energy to think about at the moment. Pushing it aside, Danny shook his head. “It’s physically impossible for me to relax. Even when Rachel and I aren’t in the same room, I can still feel her glaring at me from wherever she is.”

Meka shot him a sympathetic look. “You may be more right than you think. Stanley Edwards is rich enough that your ex-wife can afford to hire people to come glare at you when she isn’t available.” He shook his head. “I still don’t get why she’s so mad at you, though. I mean, I know the divorce wasn’t great, but she’s remarried now. The only time you have to talk at all is when it involves Grace.”

Danny rubbed the bridge of his nose, not even the mention of his daughter and the light of his life enough to dispel the incoming headache. “She’s mad I followed her and Stan here.”

Meka’s brow lowered again, and this time it actually stuck. “From what you’ve told me, you would have been more than a thousand miles away from your daughter if you hadn’t. Of _course_ you followed them.”

See, this was another reason he liked Meka – as a fellow father, he understood about this sort of thing. “Despite that, I am apparently an unfortunate reminder of her less refined past, and she’s made it perfectly clear that she wouldn’t mind if some witch turned me into a frog and I was forced to hop away into the sunset.”

Meka shook his head, but before he could say anything the door opened and the elderly woman who ran the front desk poked her head in. “Rachel Edwards is here.” She gave Danny a disapproving look, which was similar to how she looked at him most of the time. The woman had made it clear from the beginning that she didn’t like Danny, but since she adored Meka she tolerated Danny for his sake. “She says she needs to speak to Williams.”

Danny sighed again, forcing himself to stand up. “I should get home anyway – my mother will be back from visiting Bridget sometime tonight, and if she tries to cook herself a late dinner she’ll burn the house down.”

“Maybe Rachel will have her driver run you over with her carriage,” Meka offered jokingly. “Then at least you won’t have to worry about your mother killing you on accident.”

Danny gave him a mock salute, amused despite himself. “You’re a real friend, Hanamoa.”

Unsurprisingly, Rachel wasn’t actually waiting inside the station. She never did, choosing to sit in her carriage as if taking those extra steps was more of an inconvenience than she could bear. So Danny walked out to the dark, nearly deserted street, opening the carriage door. “What?”

Rachel shot him the same resentful look she always did. “You can’t have Grace this weekend,” she said primly, gloved hands folded on her lap. “Stanley and I are going to the coast and she’s coming with us.”

Anger rose up. “Damn it, Rachel, this is the _third_ time this month you’ve done this to me! I deserve to see my kid sometimes!”

Her tone became even frostier. “And you will. Later.”

He grit his teeth. “If I had the money for a lawyer—“

“But you don’t.” Rachel cut him off. “You are free to leave at any time if we are _inconveniencing_ you, Daniel.”

He glared right back at her. “I’m not going anywhere, and you know that.”

She pressed her lips together. “Fine. Shut the door.”

Knowing that yelling wouldn’t make any difference – he’d already tried it, multiple times – Danny shut the door and stepped back as the carriage drove away. He’d loved her once, he knew, but for the life of him he couldn’t remember why.

Damn it, he missed his kid. It would be another week now before he could see her again.

Scrubbing his hands across his face, he turned around and headed for home.

000

Clara Williams, Danny’s mother, was in the process of doing the same thing. She’d meant to be home already, in fact, but she’d taken a wrong turn a few roads back somewhere and had found herself deeper in the forest than she’d ever meant to go. There was something menacing about it, as if it was a forest straight out of a storybook rather than something that had actually grown. The trees seemed to have teeth, and she could almost make out words in the howling wind.

Danny, of course, would tell her she was exaggerating. But he would also save her if he was here, and get her home safely, so she thought she could probably stand him being snarky if it got her everything else.

Clara was so distracted by the thought that it took her awhile to notice that the growling was no longer coming from her imagination. Wolves were emerging from the trees, too large to be any kind of real wolves she’d ever seen, and the look in their eyes as they advanced towards her suggested that she’d be a perfect late night snack. She turned the horse, looking for escape, but more of the monster wolves slipped out of the shadows with the same hungry snarl.

She and the horse were both frantic by this point, and she thought desperately about trying to plunge the horse through those nightmare trees. She didn’t even know if the horse could make it, but the wolves were still advancing and if she died right here Danny would never forgive her.

Before she could try it, an ear-splitting roar cut through the night sky. A dark shape leapt from the shadowed trees, leaping for the wolves. The brawl was vicious, wolves flying everywhere, and Clara looked frantically back and forth to try and figure out whether she’d been saved or just plunged into worse trouble. But there was too little moonlight to see by, and she could only make out a huge shadowed form.

When it was finally silent, however, the dark shape rose and came closer. Now she could see it a little better, the shaggy mane of fur and the curved horns that rose up out of its head. One hand reached out, sharp, vicious claws gleaming in the almost nonexistent moonlight. The wind had died down, and there was a scent of blood in the air too strong for what was left to chase away. She remembered the roar, like some monster from the darkest dungeon coming to eat its innocent prey.

It was too much.

With a breath that was more of a squeak, she collapsed off the horse in a dead faint. The creature bent to catch her before she hit the ground, leaving the horse free to flee to somewhere generally far less terrifying.

A growl rumbled up from the creature’s chest. “Ma’am?” He shook her gently. “Ma’am?” When there was no response, he sighed. “Great.”


	2. Chapter 2

Danny was the first to admit that he was a worrier by nature, which meant that he didn’t let himself send out a search party for his mother when she wasn’t home by midnight. It was possible that she’d decided to stay at Bridget’s longer, and he’d get a message sent to him sometime tomorrow. Or she’d show up tomorrow, delaying the trip because she’d decided she didn’t want to travel in the dark.

But no amount of telling himself not to worry was going to be enough to help him sleep, so he was still wide awake when he heard neighing outside at 2 a.m. He flung open the door, hoping it would be his mother and afraid it would be someone telling him about an accident, but instead of either there was a panicked horse trying to force his way into the stable. His mother’s horse, to be precise, the saddle still on its back but no sign of the rider.

Shit.

He hurried outside to grab the reins, forcing the horse to calm down. Once it did, he saw a dark splash against the horse’s flank, one he was all too familiar with as a member of law enforcement. Chest going cold, he tied the horse to the nearest post rather than letting him back in the barn.

Then he ran inside, grabbed his shotgun and first aid kit, and ran back out to go find his mother.

000

Danny knew the route his mother had taken to Bridget’s, but once they’d crossed into the woods he realized that the horse was trying its hardest to shy away from a different fork in the road. Given how quickly it had raced home and tried to hide, he had a sneaking suspicion that whatever it was trying to run away from was over that way.

Which meant his mother was over there as well.

He kept forcing the horse down the path it didn’t want to go, even though he couldn’t see anything particularly menacing about this section of woods. The horse, though, kept shying away from things that weren’t actually there. The path was badly in disrepair, looking like it hadn’t been used in years despite the fact that it was wider and straighter than the more commonly used path.

Danny’s earlier thought that some sort of magic was at work sharpened, making him send up another curse at magic-users in general. Magic didn’t work very well on him, a semi-immunity he’d inherited from his father and passed on to Grace, and while he’d been tempted to dismiss the whole “missing noble” issue as part of the town’s collective insanity it was starting to look like people were deliberately being chased out of this part of the woods.

As if called by the thought, a huge black wolf leapt out of the woods to land just ahead of Danny on the path. Or, more precisely, a wolf-shaped _thing_. It was way too large to be any kind of real wolf, with glowing yellow eyes and fangs that seemed way too big and sharp to actually fit in its mouth. It was so much like something out of a storybook that Danny would have assumed it was an illusion trying to scare him, except illusions didn’t work on him and it still looked a hell of a lot like something out of a nightmare.

The horse reared back as Danny grabbed his shotgun, costing him a valuable second as he fought to get it under control. By the time he had, he was literally surrounded by the wolf-things, all of them growling like they were staring at dinner.

He fired, hitting one of them square between the eyes. The rest of them leapt.

Danny fought as hard as he could, shooting when he could and whacking the animals with the gun when he couldn’t, but no matter how hard he fought to protect himself and the horse he knew it was a losing battle. He couldn’t even run, with the wolves always cutting him off again every time he cleared a path.

He was going to die in the middle of the woods, eaten by wolf-monsters, and it was his own damn fault.

One of the wolf-monsters managed to get a bite in on the horse’s flank, making it rear back. Danny fought to hold on, but a panicked horse had more muscle power behind it than he was in any shape to counteract. He flew off, hitting a patch of ground that miraculously didn’t have any wolves in it for the moment. As he hit it basically headfirst, however, he knew he wasn’t going to be conscious long enough to take advantage of that fact.

As the blackness took him, he heard the growls of the wolf-monsters advancing on him. He almost imagined he could hear a roar as well, coming from slightly further up the path, but he was no longer conscious enough to be sure.

000

When he woke up, his first thought was pleasant surprise that he did, in fact, seem to be alive. It didn’t feel like he’d even been chewed on, at least not much – though his head still hurt like hell from the fall he’d taken, the rest of his body wasn’t making any real complaints. He wasn’t on anything close to an actual bed – or if it was, it was a terrible bed – but the thing under his cheek felt suspiciously like a… blanket?

He opened his eyes, saw the bars of what looked to be a prison cell, and realized that things had gotten complicated. Meka might have thrown him in the cell as a joke after saving his life from the wolf-monsters, but this wasn’t their cell. Most of the room was stone, for one thing, suggesting he was in a castle of some kind, and the corrosion on the bars suggested the cell hadn’t been used in awhile. A tiny window, the only source of light, made it clear the sun had risen at some point. Someone had also put a blanket under him, a nice, thick one covered in fairly dusty embroidery that was several steps above your usual prison-issue blanket. In fact, it looked like it had been yanked directly off the bed in some rich person’s very, very spare room.

Which suggested several things. One, he was dealing with nobility, which was just about his _favorite_ thing in the world. Second, they were idiots, because they had so little experience incarcerating people that they locked up someone who hadn’t committed a _damn crime_. Three, at least _someone_ out there agreed that this had been a stupid idea, and had given him the blanket as a kind of half-assed apology.

Plus: he probably wasn’t going to die. Minus: he now had a clusterfuck he needed to sort through, and he still hadn’t found his mother.

Deciding to get down to business, he headed to the bars to see what it looked like on the other side. Darkness and shadows, mostly, which didn’t tell him much. Well, onto Plan B.

“Hey!” he shouted, kicking the bars hard enough that the ring echoed throughout wherever they were. “Idiots! Imprisoning someone who hasn’t actually committed a crime is _illegal_ , you know! As an officer of the law, I’m fully within my rights to arrest _you_!”

He’d expected silence – it usually took at least a couple of tries to harass people into responding – or possibly the sound of footsteps. What he didn’t expect, however, was the growl that came from the shadows only a foot or so away from the cell. “Or self-defense.”

Danny didn’t jump – no one worked on magical crimes for very long without losing their startle reflex – but he did whirl around and jab a finger in the shadowy voice’s direction. “How in the hell was that self-defense? Unless you’re a big wolf-monster who was _trying to eat me_ , I didn’t do a single damn thing to you!” He blinked, suddenly realizing what was off about this picture. “You’ve been lurking there this whole time, haven’t you? Just standing in the dark, watching me sleep like some creeper, so you could make a dramatic comment out of the shadows.” There was a distinct silence from the voice’s direction, which was enough of an answer. “Seriously? You really don’t have _anything_ else to do with your time?”

“Nobody’s used that road for _years_ ,” the voice growled. “What were you doing there armed?”

“You cannot tell me you don’t know about the big wolf-monsters,” Danny shot back. “I’ll admit, the rifle didn’t turn out to be a ton of help, but what did you expect me to do? Go out there armed with flowers and good wishes?”

“No one _knows_ about the wolves,” the voice growled. “Anyone who survives forgets they exist as soon as they cross the boundary.”

That caught Danny’s attention. “So there _is_ a forgetting spell going on around here.” And if there were wolf monsters somewhere inside the forgetting spell, then whatever the magic wanted people to forget was on the other side. Which, since this guy knew about the forgetting spell, was probably where he was now.

Which just pissed him off more, actually.

“Are you the one who cast that dumb-ass spell?” he yelled, peering through the bars to try and get a better look at whoever was talking. “What, you decided you didn’t want to run things anymore? Decided that messing with people’s minds and, oh yeah, _homicidal wolf monsters_ was your version of retirement? You’re an _asshole_.”

There was a sound coming from the direction of the voice, and it took Danny a second to realize it was a low, constant growl. He’d heard a dog sound like that once, warning him off the property before he took a chunk out of his leg.

Unfortunately, Danny had never been very good at listening to warnings. “What, you really think your pet monster is going to scare me? I’m sure intimidation has probably worked well for you your whole life, but your luck in that area has just run out.”

A chunk of shadow _moved_ , a portion of the darkness stepping forward. The thing was huge, maybe even seven feet tall, with broad shoulders and yep, that appeared to be the outline of horns growing out of his head. He didn’t quite step into the tiny stream of light, but it was enough that Danny could see the vague suggestion of a furry face with a non-human nose. One hand closed around a bar, furry with claws at the very tip. “I _am_ the monster,” he growled, the words full of authority and what sounded like just a touch of self-loathing.

Ah hell. Now he felt guilty.

Still, the guy did lock him up in a cell, so he didn’t have to feel _that_ guilty. “I’ll admit, that’s a valid counterargument.”


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For all the reviewers who hoped for a new chapter.

The sudden silence that followed had a distinctly different tone than before. When his jailer spoke again, it was with the distinct tone of a man who is suddenly and inexplicably lost. "You're not scared of me?"

Danny narrowed his eyes, wondering what the big guy was getting at. When you were trying an intimidation routine, letting yourself get thrown like that was a pretty amateur move. "I'm kind of scared of your life choices, incarcerating innocent men whose only crime was nearly being murdered by monster wolves."

The big guy growled. "You had a gun!" he shot back, leaning forward a little into the light. The rest of the face was about what he'd expected from the shadowy outline, and combined with the self-loathing he'd heard earlier strongly implied he'd been cursed along with the rest of this mess.

The fact that he wasn't wearing a shirt shouldn't have been surprising -- buttons were probably miserable to deal with when you had claws -- but it was somehow far more annoying than the face or the horns. "I was in the middle of the woods facing wolf monsters!" Danny yelled, throwing his hands up in the air. "Anyone with sense would have had a gun!"

Now his voice was almost a roar. "For all I knew, you could have been hunting me!"

Okay, now he felt insulted. "One, that's disgusting. It's literally my job to _arrest_ people who try to shoot other sentient beings. Two, no one else even remembers you _exist_. How could anyone be coming to shoot you?"

"There are rumors, beyond the range of the spell." His voice was grim, but even then there was nothing about the big guy that was at all frightening. "Some of the biggest trophy hunters are magically immune, whether through blood or outside means. They feel that the smarter the monster is, the better the challenge."

Something alarmingly close to sympathy welled up in Danny, which was even more dangerous than guilt. To distract himself from thinking about it, he kept talking. "Okay, so I'll grant you they're assholes. But back to your original question, no -- I'm not scared of you."

"Because you're not scared of anything," he countered, the sarcasm clear in his voice.

The fact that the sarcasm made Danny like him a little more was probably proof that there was something wrong with him. Still, that meant he had to give back at least as good as he got, which meant it was time to pull out the big guns. "No, because you haven't said anything about the blanket someone threw in here."

The big guy froze for a moment, not saying a word, then immediately pulled back into the shadows. The fact that he didn't even glance over at the blanket, however, gave Danny all the answer he needed.

"And when I said 'someone,' I think we both know I meant you," he clarified, maturely resisting the urge to smirk when the silence only deepened. "And, given the fact that you were cursed by the same asshole that caused the rest of this--" a little flinch there, one he'd look into later "--and are probably the person who saved my life from those wolf monsters, I think it's time you finally stop asking me whether or not I'm scared of you. All I need to do is find my mother, and--"

Danny cut off when the guy suddenly jerked to attention. "Wait." Now he sounded genuinely _alarmed_ , which was almost as unnerving as the wolf-monsters had been. "You're looking for your _mother_? Short woman, blond hair, very loud?"

Danny went still. "Do not even _think_ of telling me you have my mother in one of these cells," he warned. "Because I'm actually in a pretty good mood now as far as you're concerned, what with you saving my life and all, but there's no way you could have _possibly_ assumed my mother was coming here to shoot you. So if you actually threw her in _jail_ \--"

"I would _never_ ," he growled, then his expression immediately shifted to something that, even with dangerously pointed teeth sticking out of his mouth, looked suspiciously like embarrassment. "We let her sleep in one of the bedrooms, but she's in the kitchen right now. She said she wanted to thank us for letting her spend the night by making breakfast."

Danny winced, visions of fires, explosions, and every piece of food she'd ever turned into charcoal flashing through his mind. "You should probably drag her away from any cooking implements immediately," he admitted. "She means well, but we actually thought she might have a fire talent for a few years before we realized she was just really, really bad at cooking. I learned to do it when I was 12, purely out of self-preservation."

Now he looked worried, even as he shook his head. "I have friends down there with her. I'm sure that--"

He was cut off by a metallic sound further down the corridor. It was the sound of metal hitting against stone, rhythmic enough to be footsteps if there'd been two of them. Far more importantly, it was coming closer.

Danny turned to the big guy. "Tell me that's not someone else I'm going to have to argue into submission."

He shook his head again, the worry in his expression sharpening as he unlocked the cell door and swung it open. "No, but it's definitely someone who's not prone to panicking."

As he finished speaking, a normal-sized candelabra hopped out of the shadows and into the light. Instead of the decoration around the central candle, however, there was the distinct shape of a woman's face.

And even from here, he could see that her tiny metal face had disaster written all over it. "Boss," she said anxiously, gesturing for him to follow her. "We could really use your help in the kitchen." She turned to Danny, giving him a once-over before gesturing to him as well. "You, too. We need all the actual hands we can get."

As he hurried down the corridor after the big moody beast guy and the walking cabdelabra, only one thought was running through his head. He should have known he'd end the day saving someone _from_ his mother.

000

The smoke hit them before they'd even made it to the kitchen, but at least there was no wall of flames to accompany them. He felt the big guy move past him, fur brushing Danny's arms as he strode ahead. "She was making scrambled eggs," he heard him mutter. "How could you set fire to a kitchen making _eggs_?"

And Danny was letting himself get distracted. "Ma!" he shouted, trying to see her outline in the smoke. "Step away from the stove, and please tell me you didn't try to put a grease fire out with water this time!"

"Danny!" his mother shouted back, clearly thrilled to hear from him and not at all alarmed. "I want you to meet some lovely people!"

"Let's make sure you don't finish destroying their kitchen first," he said, following the sound of her voice. She, wisely, was doing the same thing, and soon she was close enough to throw her arms around him.

He closed his eyes, the knot that had been in his chest since last night finally easing. "I'm glad you're okay, Ma," he breathed.

She tightened her arms around him. "I knew you'd come for me."

When the smoke started clearing, he could make out other shapes in the room. There was Mr. Brooding -- damn it, he really needed to get the guy's name at some point -- and the girl who was either also cursed or some kind of enchanted candelabra. He also made out a teapot that looked like it was shaking flour onto the fire, a clock-looking thing that looked like it was commanding a bunch of enchanted silverware, a big stewpot rolling around, and a... teacup, he was pretty sure, bouncing around trying to help. Also, unless he was really losing it, he was pretty sure the stove was waving its door back and forth trying to clear the smoke out of the room.

When the smoke was mostly gone, every single one of them were standing there staring at him. He could see the faces on all of them, watched them move in a way that furniture wasn't supposed to move, then looked over at the furry, horned face of the area's missing nobleman. He guessed everyone else here was probably originally servants, but he'd referred to them as friends. The candelabra had called him boss, but she certainly hadn't seemed deferential.

They'd clearly been in the trenches together, trapped by some asshole's curse, a hell of a long time. And once he and his mom went home, Danny would be the only person who remembered they were even here.

Unfortunately, his mother seemed to be thinking the same thing. She beamed at them all, pushing Danny forward slightly. "Everyone, this is my son Danny," she said brightly. "Danny, this is Lord Stephen McGarrett and his friends. He's the missing nobleman you've been wondering about!"

The big guy -- no way in hell was he going to call him Stephen, so Steve would have to do -- suddenly lowered his brow. "Wait -- you knew we were missing _before_ you got here?"

The clock stepped forward as well, his voice quiet but full of authority. "The curse should make that impossible."

Before he could answer, his mother threw an arm around his shoulders. "He's a little bit immune to magic, just like his father was, God rest his soul. He used to work in magical crimes, so he's even used to using his magic to help people."

At that, the teacup suddenly swiveled around to face the teapot. "Dad!" His voice belonged to a boy somewhere around Grace's age, making Danny's chest squeeze tight. "Does that mean he can help us?"


	4. Chapter 4

Steve’s expression shut down a little bit, his eyes still firmly on Danny. “You have magic?”

Given… well, pretty much everything in front of him, it made sense that the big guy would have as many issues with magic users as Danny himself did. “No, just the partial immunity,” he said quickly, wanting to reassure him. “If anything, I’m more of an anti-sorcerer.”

“But you’ll remember us.” That was from the teapot, whose deep, masculine voice was a surprise after the yellow and white filigree. “When you leave.”

Everyone in the room seemed to hold their breath at that, like Danny’s answer would be the most important thing they’d ever hear. Danny hesitated, not wanting to give anyone false hope, and his mother looked at him like she couldn’t believe he wasn’t immediately rushing in to save the day. “Of _course_ he—”

Danny immediately clapped a hand over her mouth. “I _think_ so?” he offered, hating the fact that he couldn’t say anything more definite. “I knew there _should_ be a noble of some kind serving as government for the area, and I recognized how weird it was that no one else seemed to notice. But I have no idea how the forgetting spell was constructed, and like I said my immunity is only partial. I want to help you guys, really, but when I cross back over whatever the magical border is I honestly don’t know what will happen.”

It seemed like everyone sighed at once, and the sight of shoulders – or the closest thing that the piece of enchanted dishware/furniture had – dropping in defeat all around the room made Danny’s chest tighten. “You should still tell me what’s going on, though,” he said, looking back at Steve. “The more I know, the more chance there is of some of it sticking.”

“It’s simple, brah,” the stove said. “McGarrett’s dad went loco, then some fairy lady came along and turned the rest of us into furniture. Guess she couldn’t appreciate my masterful cuisine.”

Danny looked back at Steve, who rubbed a hand across his face. “Let’s finish cleaning up in here.” He sounded so exhausted suddenly that Danny had to fight back the completely ridiculous urge to hug him. “Then I’ll tell you everything.”

The clock patted Steve’s leg in sympathy, then clapped his hands together. “Okay, everyone, you know the drill. Those who can help start cleaning up, while everyone else goes back to their places.” He turned to the candelabra. “Can you go get your fiancé? He would be a big help.”

She started moving toward the door, clearly ready to go find him, when a feather duster hurried in. “What happened?” he called out, clearly worried. “I was trying to get a guest room cleaned up a little when I saw the smoke.”

“Just a kitchen accident,” the candelabra said, wrapping her metal arms around him for a moment. “Nothing serious.”

The feather duster didn’t have arms of his own, but he leaned his head over what would have been the candelabra’s shoulders. “Good.”

Watching the obvious love between the two, Danny felt himself get pulled even deeper into the middle of this mess. His mother, who could read him better than was at all safe sometimes, kissed his cheek. “I knew you’d want to help them,” she said softly, then left to go join the cleanup.

“For all the good it might do them,” Danny said under his breath, throat strangely tight. Then he cleared it. “Can someone point me to a broom or dishrag that isn’t actually alive? I don’t want to accidentally commit assault while I’m wiping off a counter.”

000

Once the kitchen was back into shape, the stove and stewpot immediately started arguing about what _they_ should make for breakfast. Leaving them to it, Danny followed Steve partway up the stairs to a huge picture window that was probably hell to clean. The view outside wasn’t worth it at the moment, overgrown gardens and buildings that were falling apart. Danny tried to picture what it looked like before the curse, but he couldn’t make himself see anything but the disaster spread out in front of him.

He was sure, though, that Steve could. Danny turned to watch the other man’s face as he stared down at the scene in front of them, jaw tight and gaze a million miles away. He might have had fangs, fur and what looked like the nose of some kind of big cat, but Danny could still read the self-flagellation on his face like it was an open book with really big print.

Danny’s sudden, fierce desire to get that look off his face was something he was _very_ careful not to look at too closely. “I hope this is your favorite brooding spot.” He kept his voice light. “I’m sure someone who broods as much as you do probably has several, just for variety’s sake, but as a guest you really should be showing me your best, here.”

Steve’s expression relaxed a little, and something that might have actually been the ghost of a smile crossed his lips. “Favorite and best aren’t the same thing,” he said. “This is definitely the most formal of my brooding areas.”

Danny felt his own lips curve. He could always appreciate someone who could keep up with him. “What’s your favorite?”

“I’ve got a little vegetable garden, out to the side of the castle.” Unfortunately, the humor disappeared a second later. “I’m the only one in the castle who still needs to eat. The others offer to help, but they’ve suffered enough because of me. It’s not fair to make them work just to keep me fed.”

“From what your stove said, it sounds more like it was your dad’s and the fairy’s fault rather than yours.” Danny’s hand itched to do something comforting, but he forced it to stay where he was. “You can’t blame yourself for what other people do.”

Steve closed his eyes. “If it hadn’t been for me, none of them would have even been here. I tried to send them all away after my father… did what he did, and almost everyone listened to me. But these guys…” He leaned his forehead against the glass, “They didn’t want me to be alone.”

Danny’s hand, completely ignoring the firm instructions being sent from his brain, immediately began rubbing Steve’s bare arm soothingly. The feel of the fur under his fingers… was definitely something he was not going to think about. Ever. “So your big crime is being a nice enough guy that they stuck with you,” he said quietly. “Ooooh, how terrible.”

“A nice guy whose dying father decided the best gift he could give his son was to turn him into a huge, snarling monster so I couldn’t be hurt,” he said bitterly, a little bit of a growl underneath the words. “Only the ‘true love of a faithful woman’ will finally set me free.”

“That sounds suspiciously like a quote.” Steve nodded without lifting his head, the horns clinking gently against the glass as he moved, and Danny firmly ignored the twist in his stomach that absolutely, positively wasn’t disappointment. “I’ve heard of parents trying to play matchmaker for their kids, but this seems a little extreme.”

“He wasn’t always like that.” He sounded so sad suddenly that Danny almost wished for the bitterness to come back. “He tried to be a good father, and he cared about the people. He and my mother used their magic to take care of the land and help people, like leaders are supposed to.”

Danny closed his own eyes a moment, already able to see where this was going. “I take it your mom didn’t manage to stay a ‘faithful woman’?”

“She left when I was 15,” Steve said quietly. “My father got more and more distant, retreating up to his room to study magic, and left me to handle all of his responsibilities. The only way I managed it was because I had Chin, Kono and everyone else to help me.”

Hearing the guilt creep back in, Danny gave his arm as much of a shake as he could manage given their relative size difference. “Remember, we’re pulling back a little on the self-loathing. The fact that you’re all good people trapped in really shitty circumstances isn’t something to beat yourself up over.”

If the original Lord McGarrett was still alive, Danny was pretty sure he’d have to go punch him directly in the face right now. Sadly, that didn’t seem to be an option.

Finally, Steve straightened. “He cast the curse on me as he was dying. I think…” He winced, like even the thought hurt him. “I think he thought he was trying to protect me.”

“Speaking as a fellow father, I think we can still safely say that your dad had completely lost it by that point.” Danny made himself let go of Steve, sticking his hands in his pockets so they didn’t get him into any more trouble. This wasn't his story, damn it, and he needed to remember that. “Now, that part makes a twisted sort of sense to me, but I’m still not sure how the fairy got involved. Did your dad call her or something?”

“No.” Somehow, Steve’s expression got even bleaker. “And they prefer the term fae.”

Danny’s brow lowered. “So she was correcting your grammar in the middle of cursing all your friends? I haven’t had much interaction with fairies or fae or whatever the hell she wants to call it, but that seems like an extra special level of asshole.”

Steve pressed the heels of his hands against his eyes. “She was always correcting my grammar.” The words sounded like they hurt. “Even when I was a little kid.”

Danny went still. “She was your fairy godmother?”

“No.” Steve sighed, dropping his hands. “Just my regular mother.”


	5. Chapter 5

“Your mother,” Danny repeated flatly, immediately trying to figure out how to successfully punch a fae without dying horribly. “Your mother, the woman who abandoned you at 15, came back _just_ to curse all your friends and add a new level of crushing guilt to all the other shit you’re going through.”

“She told me it was the only way she could be sure everyone else would stay.” The guilt radiated out of Steve, making the pain in his voice somehow even _worse_ to listen to. “I tried to explain how wrong she was, that I’d already tried to make them leave and they wouldn’t, but she wouldn’t listen.” He swallowed. “And then she put the forgetting spell on everyone. She said it was so I wouldn’t get harassed by the locals, but….” The way his voice trailed off said far more than actual words could have. “That was pretty soon after my dad died, maybe about five or six years ago. We’ve been here ever since.”

At _that_ little series of revelations, the rage Danny had already struggled to rein in spiked past the point of all control. “I knew fairies were all selfish assholes, but that takes the fucking _cake_.” He stalked away, hands clenching and unclenching as he walked, then stalked right back and jabbed a finger into Steve’s chest. “You need to stop that guilt shit immediately and focus on how we are going to straight-up _kill_ your mother if she shows up again. Get it through your huge, hairy skull that you are the victim, just as much as everyone else in this castle, because your mother is an _asshole_ and a complete _failure_ as a parent.”  He was practically shouting at this point, but it was either this or punch a wall and he really wasn’t in the mood to break bones in his hand right now. “The only reason she did what she did is because she wanted to assuage the guilt _she_ was feeling without oh, I don’t know, having to do some actual _fucking parenting_. This is because she is clearly a _sociopath_ , like most fairies I’ve run across, so we’d probably also better figure out how to get you into therapy at some point.”

Steve’s brow furrowed. “Are you yelling at me or comforting me?”

“I am yelling in your _direction_ , which is a _completely_ different thing than yelling _at_ you. If you’re going to spend much time with me, it’s definitely going to be in your best interest to figure out the difference.” Danny forced himself to inhale, taking a step back so he wasn’t directly touching Steve anymore. “The only bit that was at you was the fact that you need to stop that guilt shit _now_. It’s already annoying as _hell_ that I can’t immediately go out and arrest your mother for something, and watching you be haunted by her sociopathy is only going to make it worse.”

Steve actually looked alarmed at that. “You can’t go after her, Danny. She’ll _kill_ you.”

 “I _know_ that, but right now facts are doing jack shit against my desire to make her really, really sorry for hurting y— everyone here.” He forced his breathing to slow down, throttling the rage back until he could actually do something useful with it. “So like I said, you need to try like hell to stop feeling guilty. If not for you, to make sure I don’t do something _really_ stupid.”

 Steve was staring at Danny now like _he_ was the magical fantasy creature in the room. “You’re serious,” he breathed, like getting furious at a sociopathic fairy wasn’t a completely normal and rational thing to do. “You’re this angry because of _us_.”

The statement was _technically_ completely true, since a portion of the anger stewing around inside Danny was for all those nice people who had literally been in the wrong place at the wrong time. There was no need to mention how big or small that portion was compared to the fury over how she’d treated Steve. “What can I say? Sociopaths with power piss me off.” He flexed his fingers to get them to stop clenching, focusing on things he could possibly _do_ to help at least start trying to fix this massive housefire of a situation. “Okay, first question. Is this one problem we have to fix, or several ones? Will your mom’s spells unravel once your curse gets broken, or do we have to attack that separately?”

“My mother _said_ it would all undo when the curse did,” Steve said quietly, but Danny didn’t miss the mistrust in his voice. Even if there hadn’t been any, Danny already knew he wasn’t prepared to trust a _word_ out of the bitch’s mouth. “But fixing them is a lot more important than fixing me. If you can figure out a way to help them, the curse isn’t even worth worrying about.” The hope that had crept into his voice was heartbreaking to hear. He’d been screwed over as much or more than any of them, and he just wanted his friends to be safe. “They’ll even be safe from the forgetting spell once they move back into town.”

Danny’s chest clenched at the mental image of Steve being left all alone out here, without his friends or most of the people in town being able to remember him. He told himself it wouldn’t happen – his friends were clearly incredibly loyal – but the truth was they’d all been through hell. If they did leave, even he wouldn’t be able to blame them.

Staring up into Steve’s eyes, he _swore_ to himself that he’d remember no matter what the magical forgetfulness barrier tried to do to him. He’d damn well make sure of it, no matter what tricks he had to pull. No matter what happened, Steve would _not_ be left alone out here.

But there was no way in hell he could say that out loud, so he forced his mind back to something practical. “Have you had the chance to get any kind of _decent_ magic user out here to see if they could fix the problem? If there are enough rumors out there to get to asshole hunters, there _must_ be some—” He cut himself off as a thought hit him, looking back at Steve with a questioning expression. “Wait. If both your parents have magic, doesn’t that mean you should—”

Steve’s solemn head shake ended the sentence before he could finish it. “Should, yes. Every test my mother ran on me when I was a kid said I had magic off the charts, but I could never manage to actually _do_ anything with it. My dad did some research, and he thinks that something about me being half fae meant my body didn’t know how to access the magic I had in me.” He sighed. “One more way I disappointed my mother.”

What willpower Danny had was still focused on making sure he didn’t punch a wall, which meant he didn’t have any left to stop himself from dragging the huge, cursed beast-guy in front of him down into a tight hug. Steve was stiff at first, clearly surprised by the unexpected hug assault, but a Williams hug was a force of nature. Your only choice was to let it happen.

When Steve finally sagged, curving his larger body around Danny’s smaller one, Danny squeezed his eyes shut tight, holding on as hard as he could. “One more time, because apparently this needs to get beaten into your skull,” he said fiercely, trying to pretend his voice wasn’t rough. “Your parents were the disappointment, not you. The fact that you haven’t gone crazy and started rampaging around the countryside after all this proves that you are a freakishly good and decent human being. If I’d met you in other circumstances, you would probably be annoying as _hell_.”

Steve’s chuckle was definitely wet, but there was enough of a lump in Danny’s throat that he wasn’t about to mention it. “I don’t know,” he managed. “I might be pretty annoying anyway.”

“Well, you did throw me in a cell, so that’s a pretty good start.” He made himself pull back, and it was way the hell harder than it should have been to take those last few steps back and let go completely. “We’ll have to see whether you get more annoying the more time I end up spending with you.”

Steve wiped at his wet cheeks, careful to avoid his claws. “You’re not even sure you’ll remember this place when you leave.”

Danny took a deep breath, more determined than he’d been since he’d moved out here to be with his daughter. “Actually, I have some ideas about that.”

**Author's Note:**

> Come check out my [original fiction,](https://jennifferwardell.wixsite.com/mybooks) my [blog,](http://jennifferwardell.blogspot.com) or say hi to me on [Tumblr](http://sanctuaryforalluniverses.tumblr.com)!


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